page_title: Pendleton Woolen Mills
section_title: Company origins
hierarchical_section_title: Pendleton Woolen Mills / Company origins
caption_attribution_description: English: Pendleton Woolen Mills, Pendleton, OR
context_page_description: Pendleton Woolen Mills is an American textile manufacturing company based in Portland, Oregon, United States. It is known for its blankets and woolen clothing.
context_section_description: The company's roots began in 1863 when Thomas Lister Kay made a transcontinental trek to the west coast and began working in Oregon's woolen mills. He went on to open his own woolen mill, the Thomas Kay Woolen Mill in Salem, Oregon. Kay was an immigrant from England and a weaver by trade. He had worked in various textile mills on the east coast of the United States. Before opening his own mill in Salem, he helped to set up only the second mill in Oregon at Brownsville.
  Kay brought his oldest daughter, Martha Ann "Fannie" Kay, into the business and after learning the operation and management of the mill, she became her father's assistant. In 1876 Fannie married retail merchant C.P. (Charles Pleasant) Bishop. This proved to be a great benefit to Kay's company and to the Bishop enterprises in the combination of manufacturing and retail sales. The Bishops passed their expertise and knowledge to their three sons: Clarence, Roy, and (Robert) Chauncey.
  In 1909 the family reopened  the defunct Pendleton Woolen Mills. The town of Pendleton, Oregon backed the family in their new business venture and the Bishops’ company also took over the name Pendleton Woolen Mills. The move to eastern Oregon made sense for the business because eastern Oregon was sheep country and having wool producers near the mills allowed the mills to significantly cut production costs. The town of Pendleton is a major railhead for the Columbia River Plateau and allowed convenient shipping for the growing business. Pendleton photographer Walter S. Bowman captured early 20th century images of the mill's interior, exterior and its workers.
  The mill now owned by the Bishops had been built in 1893 and had been a wool scouring plant where raw wool is scrubbed and packed before shipping out to the textile mills. In 1895 the mill was enlarged and converted into a textile mill and in 1896 began making Native-American trade blankets—geometric patterned robes (unfringed blankets) for Native-American men and shawls (fringed blankets) for Native-American women in the area—the Umatilla, Cayuse, Nez Perce and Walla Walla tribes. That business eventually failed and the plant stood idle until the Bishop family, spurred by Fannie Kay Bishop, purchased it. When the Bishop assumed ownership, they built a new mill with the help of the town of Pendleton, which issued bonds for the mill's construction.
caption: Pendleton Woolen Mills retail store at the original Pendleton, Oregon mill.
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